"Researchers at IBM have revealed they are working on technology which will lead to consumers being shown tailor made adverts that reflect their personal interests.

Digital advertising screens are already appearing in train stations, on bus stops and on the sides of buildings, but currently they only show generic adverts for a handful of products.

The new advertising hoardings will behave like those in the film Minority Report, starring Tom Cruise, in which Cruise's character is confronted with digital signs that call out his name as he walks through a futuristic shopping mall.

'John Anderton. You could use a Guinness right about now,' one billboard announces as he walks past.

IBM claims that its technology will help prevent consumers from being subjected to a barrage of irritating advertising because they will only be shown adverts for products that are relevant to them."

(Richard Gray, 01 August 2010, Science Correspondent for The Telegraph)

CONTRIBUTOR

SHARE

"In the future, as depicted in the 2002 film Minority Report, our periodicals will create interactive, hybrid reading/viewing experiences–with built–in sound and motion–based commercials rather than static advertisements, incorporating news footage with pages that dissolve and re–form to reflect breaking stories. Despite minute gestures in that direction, such as the Amazon Kindle and G24, The Guardian's PDF newspaper that's updated throughout the day, that vision of media–if there's really a market for it–is a long way off. ...

Nevertheless, something ... is now available weekly from Dennis Publishing, the company that gave the world The Week, Maxim and several other British 'lad magazines' as well as launched their American spin–offs. Monkey is proportioned like a glossy, has an interface that mimics the turning of pages and even has a magazine–like layout: margins, a basic two–column grid, images combined with text and print–like pacing. The difference is that Monkey's text sparkles (literally, if not figuratively), dances and slides onto the page. Many of the photos will turn into movies or slideshows (some rather naughty) when clicked, and on some spreads users can shuffle page elements, substituting one image for another. The format also changes to serve its content. A small mini–magazine with short reviews is digitally 'stitched' into the 'middle' of each issue. Additionally, most advertisements come alive, thanks either to Flash, streaming video or some combination, showing previews of movies or commercials for products framed by the equivalent of a full–page ad.

To be sure, Monkey does nothing that isn't done on other websites, and it has formal predecessors for its page interface–the arty This Is a Magazine, for one, and the webified versions of print glossies from Zinio for another. But unlike the wider web–which has evolved its own vocabulary and conventions for storytelling–and other web magazine predecessors–for which the turn–the–page interface seems a formal conceit–Monkey truly blends old and new media design conventions in a way that is both appalling and appealing."

CONTRIBUTOR

SHARE

"In futuristic Washington, D.C., a system is established that can accurately predict when criminals are going to commit murder or violent crimes. This system, known as 'Pre–Crime', was set up by the respectable Lamar Burgess (Max von Sydow) and uses the abilities of a set of 3 special individuals known as 'Pre–Cogs'. These individuals, through visions or dreams, can see into the future and give a prediction of when a violent crime will occur, usually accurate to the second.

However, John Anderton (Tom Cruise), the head of 'Pre–Crime', is envisioned to have committed the future murder of a man he has never met before, and before he can be apprehended, he sets out headstrong to solve the mystery of this murder before it inevitably happens. As precious time ticks away, and consistencies with the 'pre–cog' visions become more and more prevalent, Anderton realises that the only way he will be able to solve the mystery, is to get the 'minority report' from the female pre–cog Agatha (Samantha Morton).

The 'minority report' is a vision that only one of the pre–cogs can see. In the system, all 3 pre–cogs see the same vision the vast majority of the time, however, on occasion, the female Agatha, who has been found to be the most talented of the 3, sees something different than the other 2, but this is usually disregarded in order to preserve the credibility of the system."